When we announced last week that we had purchased a Hall of Fame vote, making a mockery and farce of the process by which veteran baseball writers anoint the elect among retired ballplayers and usher them into the sacred temple at Cooperstown, we had one question: Will the takes be strong? Happily, they were.
It would strain even our resources to provide a comprehensive list of all the reactions to our announcement, but the following should prove a reasonably useful guide.
Dan Shaughnessy, Boston Globe
Those wacky fan-boys at Deadspin bought a Hall of Fame vote from an anonymous (big surprise there) BBWAA member... Wonder what the price of disgrace is these days?
Craig Calcaterra, Hardball Talk
What better way to show that a process which is taken way, way way too seriously by those who control it is, in reality, basically a joke.
Bill Madden, New York Daily News
Vlae Kershner, San Francisco Chronicle
Still, mockery is one thing, vote-buying is something else. It should be obvious to anybody, even the editors of Deadspin, that buying and selling votes in any election is wrong.
Brian Kenny, MLB Network
Cliff Corcoran, Sports Illustrated
Vin Scully, Bill James, and John Thorn do not have Hall of Fame votes, but all three writers at GolfersWest.com do.... Deadspin’s inflammatory rhetoric concerning "the Hall of Fame ritual... dominated by neo-Puritan scolds, milquetoast handwringers, and straight-out dimwits," is also par for the course.
Steven Goldman, SB Nation
Last year the voters passed the point of self-parody. Now we have arrived at decadence and corruption.
Steve Buckley, Boston Herald
Mike Bates, SB Nation
There's absolutely no question that what Deadspin has done is wrong, and that doing so compromises them as a source of credible journalism... It's doing so at the cost of its own integrity, choosing to participate in a troubled process it is taking an active hand in making worse.
Henry Schulman, San Francisco Chronicle
Joe Lucia, Awful Announcing
The process needs fixing, and Deadspin is merely helping that process along - regardless of which players their ballot consists of, and which writer sold it to them.
Mike Oz, Yahoo
You can't dress up like the morality police when your organization's morals have been undermined. We see this play in politics all the time.
Jonah Keri, Grantland
Some guy on WLW, WLW
What you get from the Deadspin vote is something far more reflective of the general attitudes of regular baseball fans. To me it will be as if the public gets a vote... You'll have some that apply this very rigid standard, claim to take it really seriously, then vote for B.J. Surhoff and Brad Radke.
Some Redditor, Reddit
Further proof that there is nothing wrong with the baseball Hall of Fame voting process.
Either Felger or Mazz, WBZ
It's amazing, it really is. Unbelievable.
Mike Harrington, Buffalo News
Rob Neyer, SB Nation
The BBWAA could strip the ballots from every voter who's manifestly unqualified to vote and the results would be almost exactly the same.
Some guy on WGN, WGN
The fact Vin Scully doesn't get a vote? That's ridiculous. Deadspin is genius. I just like the alternative media. I enjoy... you know, and all these writers are standing up and saying "this is ridiculous." You know what's ridiculous? That Ron Santo didn't get into the HOF when he was alive.
@BleacherReport
Either Mully or Hanley, WSCR
(A previous version of this article mistakenly attributed this to Phil Hersh.)
Shame on whoever did that. Who would sell their vote? Look at some of the people who have votes: people who haven't been in an MLB press box in forever.
Ed Sherman, The Sherman Report
From "Will scumbag who sold Hall of Fame vote to Deadspin actually reveal identity?":
[T]his scumbag likely has participated in the process for years. Why now to make a statement? Oh yeah, you're getting paid. Don't worry about stabbing your brethren in the back.
From "Deadspin Hall of Fame fallout: No comment from Cooperstown, BBWA; Members outraged":
I suspect the main purpose is for some idiot to make a quick buck. Note: I didn't call the person a "scumbag" as I did in my initial post.
Deadspin's motivation also is clear, and it has nothing to do with hypocrisy. This is all about getting attention to the site.
Anonymous Hall of Fame voter who agreed to sell us his/her vote
I could care less what old-school writers think. Newspapers aren't even relevant anymore.